Have We Been Looking for Love and Security In All The Wrong Places?

You are an independent woman. You have a successful job that others would kill for; you have a fabulous home and supportive girlfriends. You are the personification of the perfect 21st century woman, yet you can’t shake the feeling: your life is incomplete. Why?

Women have a natural desire to feel secure. We want unconditional love without judgment or criticism. We long for affection and affirmation. We want to feel protected and be financially stable.

There is nothing wrong with these desires.

Somehow we allow our self-worth to be determined by whether or not we’re in a relationship, and unfortunately, a lot of women look to the opposite sex in search of this false sense of security. Feeling lonely, we force ourselves into unhealthy relationships. Fear of being alone can cause a woman to make foolish choices. Many will fight to keep a man close even when it’s obvious to everyone around her he needs to be let go.

The first mistake is allowing a sense of self-worth to be determined upon another human being. Our opinion of ourselves should not be generated by the love of a man, but rather, derived from the love of the Son of Man. Our value has been set by the Creator! We deserve good things because God has justified us. We are free to love the person God created us to be, just as we are, without any outside influences.

Do you remember the late, great Whitney Houston’s song, “Run to You?” I used to love this song. I would sing it all the time, in the shower, in my room, riding in a car, or on the bus. It was my jam. As a teenage girl, I secretly wanted to have someone to sing it to me. As silly as it seems now, I wanted to express that exact sentiment to the man of my dreams!

“Oh a girl who’s scared sometimes

Who isn’t always strong

Can’t you see the hurt in me?

I feel so all alone

I want to run to you

I want to run to you

Won’t you hold me in your arms

And keep me safe from harm

I want to run to you

But if I come to you

Tell me, will you stay or will you run away?”

I thought it was the most romantic song. A woman exposing her vulnerability and expressing the need for her man seemed romantic. Now I read these lyrics and see a misguided, confused woman. I was so impressionable and didn’t realize it. This woman was looking for something from a man that she needed to have been seeking from God. This is the second mistake: instead of running to God we run to a man.

If you have to ask your man, “…Will you stay or will you run away?” chances are you are going to be disappointed. But you can run to Jesus and be absolutely sure His arms are open and warm. You will find safety from harm and He will not run away. As a matter of fact, He has been trying to get you all to Himself. He’s waiting to tell you, “Just trust me. I want to give you all that your heart desires and more.”

Once you’ve experienced true Love, it seems silly to go running after people and things that don’t matter. You can wait patiently for the one Christ is preparing for you, becoming the woman of His dreams!

If I had run to Him from the beginning, I would have saved myself lots of heartache. But thank God I eventually got it right. God eventually presented the right man… and when I ran into his arms, I didn’t have to ask any questions. He, my God-given man, was upfront with his intentions for me. Jesus and I were already intimately acquainted. We have our own thing going own!

Jesus told me he was The One. As a result, I feel secure in my husband’s arms because he loves me like Christ loves the Church. The emptiness that I once felt is no more. But as much as it is because of my wonderful husband, it has more to do with my wonderful God, in whom I am safe and secure!

The more we embrace truths from Scripture about who we have become in Christ, the more stable, grateful, and fully assured we will be in this world; knowing that the best security lives on the inside of us!!